Brushing your teeth has long been the most effective way to rid your mouth of bacteria, prevent tooth decay, and improve your overall oral health. However, you can only achieve that effectiveness with proper toothbrushing. It may come as a surprise, but many patients actually make a handful of mistakes when brushing. These mistakes, in turn, diminish your oral care efforts. More importantly, you could actually harm your teeth and gums instead of protecting them.
Don’t let your efforts be in vain and learn the techniques of proper toothbrushing with Cyprus Family Dental in Magna, UT. Here, we strive to provide patients with incredible service as well as helpful information necessary in maintaining oral health. With this, we’ve compiled a list of both mistakes to avoid and proper techniques.
Proper Toothbrushing: 5 Mistakes to Avoid
As mentioned, there are some often-made mistakes most patients are guilty of. It’s essential to avoid these mistakes in achieving proper toothbrushing, as they could potentially cause harm to your teeth. To get the most out of your toothbrushing efforts, beware of the mistakes listed below:
- Brushing too hard: Patients often think the harder they brush the better, but this is certainly not the case. Brushing too hard can actually harm your teeth, especially your gums, which can swell and even bleed.
- Brushing right after a meal: Surprisingly, you need to wait 30 minutes after eating before brushing. After a meal, the pH in your mouth is more acidic, and brushing is actually harsh on your teeth and enamel.
- Improperly storing your toothbrush: Storing your brush out in the open leaves it prone to airborne bacteria. Keep your brush in a drawer or use a cover.
- Using your brush too long: Similar to storing your brush, you need to buy a new one every 2-3 months, as bacteria will start to accumulate along the handle and on the bristles.
- Forgetting the tongue: Brushing your tongue should be just as much as a priority of brushing your teeth. The tongue harbors a great deal of bacteria, which will reach your teeth after brushing if you don’t scrub it thoroughly.
5 Techniques for Proper Toothbrushing
In addition to avoiding the mistakes listed above, you can do more to better your toothbrushing practices. Brushing isn’t really as simple as grabbing your toothbrush and freely scrubbing. You need to target certain areas of your mouth and vary the way you brush. For help, check out the list of tips to follow:
- Use a soft-bristled brush to avoid brushing too hard and damaging your gums.
- Ensure you brush for a solid two minutes, once when you wake up and again before going to bed.
- Reach behind the back molars and be sure to get the inner surfaces of your teeth.
- Brush in a circular pattern with your brush at an angle, rather than brushing back and forth.
- Switch up your brushing pattern. If you stick to one pattern, you could be continually missing certain areas of your teeth. Start brushing from a different area of your mouth each time.
Enhance your Dental Care With Cyprus Family Dental
Proper toothbrushing is easy to accomplish and it will go a long way in protecting your teeth from decay and your gums from infection. By avoiding these mistakes and improving your techniques, your brushing efforts will surely be up to par. On top of it all, we recommend every patient visits Cyprus Family Dental twice a year for checkups and cleanings. At our office, Dr. Cantwell can look for underlying issues and make sure you get the best dental care possible! To schedule an appointment, give us a call at 801.250.0203 or contact us here.